Page 21 of Riding with the President Biker

"Handled my brother," I say.

He sets the rag down and something moves through his expression — restrained, like he is deciding how much of it to show. "Did you."

"We had a conversation. A real one." I stop in front of him, hands in my jacket pockets. "He's not thrilled. He's also not going to make it a problem."

He considers me for a moment. "You went to him…"

"Of course I did."

"Most people don't go looking for that conversation."

"Most people haven't told a room full of heavily armed men to take it down a notch and watched it actually work," I say. "I'm feeling relatively confident."

The corner of his mouth moves. Not the half-shape from the night at the bar, but fuller than that, real enough to reach the lines at the corners of his eyes. "You told a room full of heavily armed men."

"There were two of you. It was a very small room."

"Grave is six-foot-three."

"I've worked on larger." I tilt my head. "You're not bad yourself, for the record. Very presidential. All that jaw tension." I gesture vaguely toward the bruised side of his face. "Adds gravitas."

He makes a sound that is almost a laugh, short and genuine, and the sound of it does what it did in the bar the first time.

He steps toward me and his hand comes to my jaw, tilting my face up. His thumb moves across my lower lip where it is still slightly swollen at the corner, the pressure barely there, and I feel that light touch more acutely than most things I have felt with significantly more force behind them.

"This one's fading," he says.

"I told you I've had worse."

"You also told me you weren't in a hurry." His eyes move to mine. "That assessment still accurate?"

"Depends on the context."

"Clarify the context."

I put my hand flat against his chest, feeling the warmth of him through the fabric. "The hurrying I was referring to was situational," I say. "Circumstances have changed."

The look he gives me then is the one from last night stripped of all the restraint that was running underneath it, and I feel it from my sternum down.

His hand moves from my jaw to the back of my neck, unhurried, and he leans down and kisses me. It’s entirely unhidden, in the middle of the street where anyone walking through can see exactly what it is.

When Hansen finally lifts his head, I become aware in my peripheral vision of the low, lived-in reactions around us: Morgan near the far wall with a look that is somewhere between resigned and entertained. Two prospects near the door exchanging a glance. Someone I cannot identify lets out a quiet sound that is almost a laugh.

Hansen does not check any of those reactions.

He keeps his eyes on me.

That, more than anything else, tells me everything about the kind of claim this is.

I stand in the middle of the Night Wolves' clubhouse with smoke still faint in the air and snow still visible through the high windows, and I think about walking into a bar with no intention of staying. I think about a window exploding and a man I did not know pulling me behind a bar without hesitating. I think about a concrete chair and counting turns and memorizing a rasp in a man's breathing. I think about standing between two men who would both, in their different ways, burn the world to its foundation for me, and choosing to stand there on my own terms rather than either of theirs.

I do not feel owned.

I feel like I made a decision that belongs to me, and the man in front of me is the one I made it about, and that distinction is the whole thing.

"So," Hansen says, quiet enough that only I hear it. "Practical question."

"Ask it."